Disclaimer

When I began putting this website together, I quickly
found out what was most challenging. It wasn’t learning how to read genealogical
documents in foreign languages such as Ukrainian, Polish, Latin, Russian, German
or Church Slavic. It wasn’t finding out how to obtain critical resources needed
to research one’s family from across an ocean in a land once dominated for
decades by a suspicious and unwelcome Soviet state bureaucracy. It wasn’t the
hundreds of books and periodicals read on the region. No, it wasn’t any of these
things. The most challenging aspect to the site was determining what terminology
to use on the most basic subjects!

Regardless of which rulers and which churches dominated
the region of Galicia, the fact remains that it was home to a varied group of
different nationalities, religions and languages. Since all of my own personal
family research has brought me to study the Polish and Ukrainian aspects of
Galicia, I will only focus on these two groups on this site. I am fully aware of
the other groups who called the region home: the Jews, Gypsies, Germans,
Armenians. Those of the Jewish, Protestant, and Orthodox faiths. Those who spoke
Yiddish, German, Armenian and Roma. It is not a matter of choice that I give
little information on these groups, rather it is simply a matter of space that I
include very little on these subjects. I hope to one day include more
information on these groups. For now, I will do what I can by providing links to
websites which devote their time to the genealogy of these peoples.

Now, dealing only with Polish and Ukrainian genealogy of
Galicia does not make life any easier. However, instead of ‘towing the line’ of
others who undoubtedly have an agenda to ‘win you over,’ I will tell you my side
of Galician genealogy.

My ancestors came from the parish of Bilyi
Kamin (Білий Камінь) / Biały Kamień, located about 35
miles east of L'viv (Lwów). My ancestors spoke both Polish and Ukrainian equally
fluently. Regardless of their own choice of church, either Roman Catholic or
Greek Catholic, they attended both services for holy days, baptisms, marriages
and funerals. They felt equally at home in both. My ancestors, both Roman
Catholic and Greek Catholic, both Polish and Ukrainian, were equally poor as
their neighbors. In Bilyi Kamin (Білий Камінь) / Biały
Kamień, although there were two churches, one Roman Catholic and one Greek
Catholic, you will find only ONE cemetery. As a distant relative of mine, Hanna
Makarovska, a 7th cousin I found while visiting Bilyi Kamin (Білий
Камінь) / Biały Kamień, once addressed me on this very subject: "They
lived together, worked together, and are buried together."

Regarding nationalism. I will not use my website to
promote anti-Ukrainian or anti-Polish animosity. Of course, history was not kind
to Ukrainians and Poles living in Galicia. Mistrust and bloodshed were far too
often the result of politics, language and cultural barriers of outsiders,
extreme poor economic conditions, religious zeal, xenophobia and general
bigotry.

I understand that during your own quest to learn more
about your ancestral home of Galicia you will come into contact with these
negative traits. I only ask you to do what I have done....read anything and
everything you can on the subject.... but with an open mind. Never read only one
point of view. Times are changing. (Remember, Poland was the first country to
officially recognize Ukraine’s independence from the Soviet Union.) Of course,
one should not ignore or forget the past....it is still too valuable to us
(especially to us genealogists). But more importantly, however, one should look
forward to the future with more eagerness, hope, and understanding.